


Time Out of Joint

by Politzania



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2017-12-29
Packaged: 2019-02-23 13:41:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13191291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Politzania/pseuds/Politzania
Summary: A group of people are plucked out of their respective timelines and find themselves placed together in captivity.  What could they possibly have in common?





	Time Out of Joint

Bucky wasn’t surprised to wake up in the dark on a hard, cold floor. After all, he’d been doing so for nearly a month, and before that it was the cold, hard, and occasionally wet ground that had more often as not been his bed. But he was surprised to be waking up alone. Well, no, perhaps not alone. But where there should have been evidence of scores of other prisoners -- prayers, curses and sobs in multiple languages -- there were only echoes of barely heard whispers and a slight sound of movement nearby.

The stagnant stench of unwashed bodies had been replaced with a damp musty breeze that prickled over Bucky’s skin. Out of habit, he pressed his hands over his mouth to stifle the wet, wracking cough he felt coming, determined to hide his illness for yet another day. He strained his eyes against the darkness for any clue as to where he was. Could they have drugged him and sent him to the infirmary? A chill ran down his spine that had nothing to do with the temperature. No one had ever come back from being treated by Doctor Zola. 

As if to confirm his train of thought, a wheezing rattle of breath came from off to his left. Bucky stiffened -- the sound was eerily familiar. But it couldn’t be ... that punk was a goddamned ocean away. He had to be hallucinating, a side effect of being so sick. But Bucky held his own breath in sympathy, even as the wheeze rose in pitch. Whoever it was, he had to try to help. 

“Hey,” he called out in an urgent whisper, “calm down a little and sit up straight. Shoulders back, like you just got called to attention.” 

“Buck? Is that you?” Jesus, Mary and Joseph ... it was Steve. Hell if he knew how, but that was definitely him. But before Bucky could respond, a voice called out from a distance away. 

“Uh -- hello?” After the initial cautious question, the voice -- presumably an American from his accent -- continued a little more self-assuredly. “So, yeah, I’m kinda used to waking up in strange places with a hell of a headache, but I usually get to enjoy an evening of debauchery first. Pretty sure that didn’t happen. Anyone else out there know what the hell’s going on?” 

Another voice, slightly deeper and sounding more upset than the first muttered something indistinct. “I’m trying to collect intel, Rhodey,” the first voice replied. “Thought you’d be proud of me, taking initiative and all.” 

Bucky stifled a laugh; the tone of that exchange sounded very familiar. He wasn’t at all surprised to hear Steve chime in. “Sorry - can’t help ya. I dunno what’s goin’ on, either.” He wheezed out the last word, but had said enough for Bucky to be able to make a rough guess as to his location and he crawled quietly over to his friend. 

“Thought I told you to stay home, Steve.” Bucky kept his voice low, not wanting to draw attention. 

“Stay home? You’re the one who dragged me out on yet another double-date and got us mugged!” Steve wasn’t nearly as quiet with his response. No sense of self-preservation, but he’d known that about his pal for years. 

“What the hell are you talking about -- ‘double date’?” 

“The World of Tomorrow Expo.” 

Something very, very odd was going on. First off, Steve shouldn't be here, wherever 'here' was. Especially if he were suffering from amnesia, to think that an event from months ago had happened just the night before. But before Bucky could put together a reply, a flickering light caught his eye. It was coming in from one end of the room; no, they were in more of an alcove, maybe ten by fifteen feet, with rough stone walls arching overhead on three sides to form the ceiling. He and Steve were alone, which meant the other two men they'd heard talking had to be on the other side of that opening. 

Bucky clambered to his feet, leaning heavily against the wall as his head swam. Steve stood as well and rushed over to Bucky’s side, offering his support. He looked in shock at his friend’s ragged clothing, and wrinkled his nose at the smell. “Jesus, Bucky, what happened to you?” 

“I don’t think you’d believe me if I told ya, champ.” Keeping one hand against the wall, Bucky walked towards the opening of their alcove, only to be met by the two other men. The one holding up a flaming hunk of wood for light looked somehow familiar, with his mustache and goatee and fancy suit, while the other man -- a colored fellow -- was dressed more simply in a shirt and slacks. 

“Howdy, neighbor!” The torch-holder was the man they’d heard speaking before. “Please allow me to introduce myself, I’m a man of wealth and taste. Tony Stark, genius billionaire playboy philanthropist, at your service. This is Colonel Jim Rhodes, US Air Force and my BFF.” Tony’s companion sighed heavily. “What, Rhodey - how much more trouble can we get in at this point? Anyways, we seem to be trapped in some sort of dungeon, best we can tell, with no idea how we got here or why. How about you two?” 

“Are you any relation to Howard Stark? The inventor guy?” Steve asked. After a moment of confusion, Bucky remembered the Expo and the flying car demonstration. Yeah, he could see a bit of a resemblance between the two men. 

“Yeah. Howard was my father.” Tony held the torch closer to them, with a look of confusion on his face. Rhodes came nearer as well, also on alert. 

Steve shook his head. “You gotta be kidding - that guy’s younger than you by a good ten, fifteen years!” 

“Wait just a minute, shrimp,” Tony responded belligerently, “I don’t know what you’re trying to pull here... ” Oh, that was the wrong thing to say to Steve, Bucky thought, seeing his friend get his back up, just like usual. 

“Hold on,” he broke in. “Let’s finish the introductions. I’m Sergeant James Barnes, Bucky to my friends.” Tony started to hold out his hand, but stopped suddenly. Bucky ignored the slight and continued, “I usually clean up a bit better, but the Nazis don’t exactly put their prisoners up in four-star hotels.” He gestured to Steve. “This is Steve Rogers, a friend of mine from back in Brooklyn.” Tony’s confused look turned to one of utter disbelief, a near match for Steve’s startled expression. 

“Uh, yeah, no.” Tony said, backing away and putting his hands up as if to fend them off. “This is one hell of a hallucination. That or the universe has truly decided to fuck with me, because there is no way these two guys are who they say they are... right, Rhodey? I mean, one minute, I was in an armored vehicle convoy in Afghanistan, taking selfies with the troops, and the next -- after a minor blackout -- I’m here, in a goddamned cave talking to two--” 

Rhodes broke in, “Tony, you were not just in Afghanistan. That was almost a year ago.” He put one hand on Tony’s shoulder, turning him so they faced each other. "Did you hit your head? Is that why you don't remember? ” He started looking his friend over, as Steve grabbed at Bucky’s arm. 

“And what the hell are you talking about, Buck? Nazis? Prisoner?” He was wheezing again, either due to the excitement, or the smoke of the torch. They were interrupted by the sound of a scuffle and the four of them turned as one and looked down the passageway. 

Two figures tumbled out of another alcove in a tangle of limbs. “Aw, nose, no!” A young man clutched at his face and, with a flash of long, red hair, a young woman fled into the darkness. The man was blond, maybe in his late twenties and wore black pants and a black vest with no shirt on underneath. He held himself like a fighter, but seemed more interested in stopping his nosebleed at the moment. 

“Hey! What were you doing with her?” Rhodes called out, clearly concerned for the girl.

“Getting my ass kicked,” the guy replied, trying to make eye contact while tipping his head back and pinching his nose shut. “Woke up with no idea what was going on, and all of a sudden this girl -- who I’ve never seen before in my life, may I add -- she jumps me and starts dealing some damage. I swear, all I did was defend myself.” 

Rhodes, who was still watching him closely, asked, “So, who are you and what’s your story?” 

The man’s face went wary, then blank. “Name’s Barton. Clint Barton. And would you believe I was at the circus?” 

Before any of them had a chance to respond, the woman returned. Despite not looking a day over fifteen, she held a pistol steady in one hand and had a wicked-looking knife sheathed at her waist. Bucky suspected Barton had gotten off lucky with a mashed-up nose. “Who are you and what are you doing here?” she said, a hint of an accent in her voice as her eyes darted between them. “Are you SHIELD agents as well? I will not go without a fight.” 

“Calm down, miss,” Rhodes said, hands raised in calming gesture. “We’re all just as confused as you are. No one’s going to hurt you.” 

“Think the opposite is the more likely case, platypus,” Tony muttered out of the side of his mouth. The tense standoff lasted a few minutes until they heard movement from behind them. Two more men came toward them from the other end of the hallway, and when the girl aimed at them, they both stopped and raised their hands. 

“Uh, hi. We heard you talking just a bit ago. I’m Bruce. Doctor Bruce Banner. Miss, would you mind...?” He gestured for the girl to lower her gun, and strangely enough, she did. Banner seemed to radiate calmness, and his companion also seemed surprisingly at ease considering their situation. “This is Sam Wilson. Since we seem to be stuck here, mind if we join you?” 

“Sure,” Tony shrugged. “The more the merrier. As you said, it’s not like we’re going anywhere.” 

They went around the circle, introducing themselves. The girl only gave the name Natalya, and wouldn’t say where she was from, or what she’d been doing. After Bucky and Steve gave their names, both Banner and Wilson gave them searching looks. 

“See, Rhodey? It’s not just me! I mean, what kind of coincidence--” Tony exclaimed, before Wilson interrupted. 

“Crazy as it sounds, Mr. Stark, I think I know what you’re getting at.” He looked carefully around the circle. Tony raised his eyebrows at the formal address, but said nothing. 

Banner had a notebook in his hand, and was tearing out pages. “Humor me for a moment. Write down the date - month, day and year, and the last thing you can remember doing.” He passed around a pencil and they each scribbled something down. While everyone was working on this exercise, passing around the few writing implements they happened to have on them, Bruce pulled Steve aside. “Does the name Dr. Abraham Erskine mean anything to you?” he asked. “How about Peggy Carter?” Steve shook his head. 

After collecting the papers back from everyone, Wilson read through each, pursing his lips. “Okay... assuming none of you are messing with us -- I have dates ranging from 1943 to 2014, which is me.” He held the papers up, writing facing out towards the group, who had fallen silent. 

“I don’t know what you all are up to, but I’ve had just about enough of all this. I’ve been kidnapped before -- I don’t need to be dealing with a bunch of nutcases on top of all this.” Tony had been pacing since before they’d written down the dates and was getting more agitated by the moment. 

“Calm down, Tones. Let’s see what these guys have to say.” Rhodes had taken Tony’s arm to halt his pacing; another gesture Bucky was all too familiar with. 

Wilson looked at Banner. “You want to start?” 

“No, you go ahead - I think you’ve got the best picture of what’s going on.” 

“I don’t know about that, but here goes,” Wilson replied. He pointed at Tony. “Tony Stark, you I’m betting you’re the one who put down May 13, 2009 and weapons demo in Afghanistan.” Tony nodded slowly. “You’re the creator and operator of the Iron Man personal combat suit. You built it from scratch to escape from captivity and fly to freedom.” 

Tony responded with scepticism in his voice. “The who in the what now? ‘Personal combat suit’? And it flies? Sounds awesome and totally like something I’d build, but I didn’t. I haven’t. I would definitely remember something like that.” Bucky noticed Tony skipped right over the ‘captivity’ portion of Wilson’s statement. 

“You’ve actually built more than one, including a suit for Colonel Rhodes.” Wilson turned to Rhodes with a deferential nod. “Sir. I’m guessing you wrote down May 19, 2010 and Tony's birthday party in Malibu. Is that when Stark first gave you War Machine?” 

“More or less -- but he wasn’t exactly giving it to me,” Rhodes answered cryptically. 

Wilson went on. “Iron Man was the first person recruited by SHIELD to form The Avengers -- a team of superheroes who ended up defending the world against an alien invasion." He glanced around and read their expressions. "I know it sounds crazy, but it gets even better. Also on the team is Captain America, a World War II super-soldier who had been frozen in the Arctic for seventy years before getting discovered and revived.” Turning to Steve, he added, “His real name is Steve Rogers.” 

Absolutely dumbfounded, Steve spluttered, “What are you talking about? Frozen for seventy years? A super-soldier? This isn’t funny, Wilson.” 

“I knew it!” Tony crowed. “I knew I recognized you, Rogers! Jesus, Dad never shut up about Captain America and what a shining example of truth, justice and the American Way he was. God, did I ever resent you.” He said the words with his teeth clenched behind a sharp grin, and Bucky resisted the desire to sock the guy in the mouth. 

“I can explain a little about the super-soldier element,” Banner jumped in. His steady voice and calm demeanor were a welcome counterpoint to the suddenly tense atmosphere. “I’ve been working with a team to replicate the process that was used in June 1943 to change Rogers into the perfect soldier: taller, stronger, faster, and smarter than the average man, and with accelerated healing abilities. It worked, and we got Captain America.” Steve gaped, and Bucky stifled an amazed laugh. So much for his pal not doing something stupid while he was gone. 

“Unfortunately, the formula was lost when the doctor in charge was assassinated, so Rogers was the only one to go through the process. Until me,” Banner added, with a self-deprecating look. “I was scheduled to begin the injections tomorrow, April 16th, 2005. That would have been followed by exposure to gamma rays, to replicate Howard Stark’s Vita Rays. But according to Sam here, things didn’t go well.” Banner wore a tense, tight smile. “Apparently, I temporarily transformed into a muscle bound bundle of rage and wiped out several New York City blocks before I came back to myself. I disappeared for awhile and then somehow got recruited for the Avengers.” 

A look of recognition flashed across Rhodes’ face. “I heard about that mess in Harlem. Well, not a whole lot, since it was super top secret military stuff, but yeah, okay.” Tony in turn was still pacing, but appeared to be actually considering what Banner and Wilson were saying, now with Rhodes’ corroboration. 

Bucky’s own mind reeled. They all seemed to be telling the truth... no matter how insane it seemed. He knew his own best friend too well to be fooled; Steve honestly believed he’d just attended the Expo the night before and Bucky knew in his bones that their trip had been months ago. As for the others, claiming to be from decades in the future, well, it sounded like something out of those science fiction pulp magazines he and Steve used to read as kids. But the stories meshed too well to be made up on the fly. 

Wilson turned to Barton and Natalya. “I don’t know much about the other Avengers, but I’m guessing you’re Hawkeye, a SHIELD agent who’s a phenom with a bow and arrow, and you’re the Black Widow, a Russian spy who defected and is working for our side. I think I can guess which one of you put January 1991 and 'the hoosegow' on your paper.” 

Barton raised his hand. “Guilty. And Hawkeye’s my stage name. I do a trick archery act in a small-time circus. Which happens to be cover for a gang of thieves, and I’m their lookout. I’d just gotten busted and I guess someone thought I could be more useful outside of jail than in." He looked up with a wry grin. "Kinda hard to believe I get to hang with superheroes.” 

When all eyes turned to Natalya, she stared defiantly at them in return before saying, "February 1997, Budapest." She gave Barton a particularly baleful stare. “So, you do not remember what you said to me?” 

“Sorry, sweetheart. They yanked me out and put me here before I met you,” Barton replied. “Guess you didn’t take it well, by the way you attacked me just now.” 

A quick, guilt-stricken look crossed her face. “Perhaps you spoke the truth. You offered me a chance to start over. I didn’t believe you then, but...” she shrugged and nodded to Wilson, “he tells a different tale.” 

“So that’s what we’re going with?” Tony asked, “That someone or something is targeting this group of so-called Avengers by pulling us out of our timeline just prior to whatever moment in our lives turned us into superheros?” He threw up his hands in exasperation. “Doesn’t explain what you, or Barnes or Rhodey are doing here.” 

“That’s what’s puzzling me,” Wilson replied. “Plus, there was another Avenger. Thor of Asgard. You know, the god of lightning and thunder, from Norse mythology, but for real. He’s from another planet, or plane of existence or something. Maybe he’s not here because the Powers That Be couldn’t reach him. As for Rhodes, well, you’ve teamed up with Stark in those suits to take out some bad guys, so I guess that accounts for you being here.” 

“What about you, and Barnes, though?” Barton asked. 

“I used to fly pararescue with an experimental set of jet wings.” Wilson said. “Nothing quite as fancy as Iron Man or War Machine, but still pretty damn cool. But that’s all behind me, now.” His expression grew distant and sad for a moment. “Anyways, the last thing I remember was being out on my morning run and getting lapped by a big blond guy like I was standing still. Come to think of it, maybe that was you, Rogers, and you were gonna hit me up to join the superhero club.” 

All eyes turned to Bucky. He shrugged. “I was in a German POW camp, guess it was early November in 1943. We were put to work making these strange, unearthly weapons. I was getting sick, and was scared to death they’d send me to Doctor Zola, a mad scientist type. No one ever came back after he ‘treated’ them.” 

“But you did,” Tony said slowly. “Cap found you, and about two hundred other men and got you all back to safety. You and he and a half-dozen soldiers from the camp formed the Howling Commandos and went after Zola and his boss, a megalomaniac by the name of Schmidt. But then, during a mission, you fell to your death off a train.” 

The matter-of-fact statement hit Bucky like a blow, and Steve gasped. 

“Not his death.” Natalya said solemnly, breaking the silence that had followed Tony's statement. “A rebirth. He was rescued. They fixed his damaged body, wiped his mind and claimed him as one of their own. He became their prize asset. The fist of HYDRA, codename Winter Soldier.” 

Bucky felt his knees give out and he sank to the floor. To hear all at once that he would have been rescued and gotten to see Steve again, only to then die and be reborn as a weapon wielded by someone else -- it was too much to wrap his mind around, especially in his weakened state. 

“HYDRA, huh? That makes him more of a villain than a hero in my book,” Tony said darkly. 

“You take that back, mister!” Steve yelled, balling his fists as he knelt at Bucky’s side. 

“Hold on,” Banner said mildly. “If something like the Hulk could be used for good, and Miss Natalya here switched sides, I think we can give Barnes the benefit of the doubt.” 

“Fine," Tony huffed. "So now that there’s no instant Charles Atlas for Rogers, no Jeckyl and Hyding for Banner, no shiny metal suit for me or Rhodey, and no wings for Wilson what do we do? Barton’s presumably got his skills, but no equipment. Natalya the Red over there has a pistol and a knife, at least.” He heaved a huge sigh, and sat down.

“You’re the self-proclaimed genius, champ,” Steve replied sourly. “You figure it out.”

**Author's Note:**

> Unfortunately, I have no idea what happens next. But since this idea has been hanging around my WIP folder since Sept 2015, I thought it deserved to be set free. If anyone wants to take over from here, be my guest--- just keep me in the loop. :^)
> 
> 20 Apr 2018 - thanks to @tisfan - this fic now has an [ Extended Remix](https://archiveofourown.org/chapters/33150063) with a plot and everything!


End file.
